The other night I saw a commercial for “body spray” for men, by Gillette or Mennen (we’ll just call them Gillennen for convenience; they’re pretty much the same company anyway). Body spray, for the unenlightened or previously uninterested, is basically full-coverage cologne. If your man-funk is overwhelming the standard arsenal of male hygiene: deodorant, aftershave, cologne, and/or mouthwash, then presumably you need this.

I recall when this stuff was first marketed years ago, and only to women. I have this single remembered mental image of a bare female torso leisurely spraying her tummy with aerosol. So leisurely, in fact, that most of the spray actually went into the air on either side of her. Presumably you could get the same effect, with a lot less waste, by rubbing a Glade solid air freshener all over yourself, but I digress.

Now, years later, some MBA-of-the-Week at Gillennen has decided to resurrect the full-contact odor eater and figured out a way to push it on their primary demographic: straight men.

Cut to commercial: a white guy and a black guy are sitting on a couch, watching “the game” and whooping it up. Their long suffering wives/girlfriends are sitting at the kitchen table, bitching about their testosterone-saturated lives, when the white guy ducks into the kitchen and gives his girl (the white one, go figure) a big hug and grunts something along the lines of “love you babe”. The girl inhales and is cast adrift on waves of dreamy bliss by the presence of her artificially scented man. Suddenly all is forgiven, and men are once again supreme objects of desirability. Not that they weren’t already. haha.

So guys, get yourself a can of Gillennen’s Stank-B-Gone, douse yourself like you’re priming charcoal for the grill, and start forgetting birthdays and anniversaries with wild abandon. One whiff, and your magical odeur will incite forgiveness and lust in equal measures.

Future marketing hacks, remember! Dress up anything, no matter how unmanly, in sports, women, or beer, and you’ve got yourself a winner.